What The Fish?

How did a quiet, unassuming little fish stand at No. 86, Pike Place, Seattle, USA became world famous?

It is not just the fish that make this place world famous.

There are hundreds of thousands of fish stalls all over the world which people visit everyday. But these fishmongers just go about their normal business as usual without any thought of seeking "world famous" status to attract customers to improve their business.

To find out what makes the Pike Place Fish Market special and unique, please read on.

The following articles are excerpts from its website at http://www.pikeplacefish.com

We are the Seattle fresh fish company that everyone talks about. Besides offering only the best quality, freshest seafood, our dedication to having fun and creating excitement while we work makes us "world famous."

John Yokoyama purchased Pike Place Fish in 1965. At that time, John was one of several employees of the quiet, unassuming little fish stand. After numerous unsuccessful attempts to sell the business, John’s employer offered him the opportunity to purchase Pike Place Fish. As a young man of 25, John was at first hesitant to buy the business. The monthly payments on his new 1965 Buick Riviera, however, were taking much of his $150.00 weekly pay. He decided he could do better on an owner’s salary. John purchased Pike Place Fish to help make his car payments - amazing how things turned out!

The first step for us at Pike Place Fish was to decide who we wanted to be. In the words of John Yokoyama:“In one of our early Pike Place Fish meetings with Jim (our coach from bizFutures), we began an inquiry into "Who do we want to be? We wanted to create a new future for ourselves. One of the young kids working for me said, “Hey! Let's be World Famous!” At first I thought, “World Famous…what a stupid thing to say!” But the more we talked about it, the more we all got excited about being World Famous. So we committed to it. We added “World Famous” to our logo and had it printed on our shipping boxes

Then, after a while, we asked ourselves, “What does this mean - being world famous?” And we created our own definition. For us it means going beyond just providing outstanding service to people. It means really being present with people and relating to them as human beings. You know, stepping outside the usual “we’re in business and you’re a customer” way of relating to people and intentionally being with them right now, in the present moment, person to person. We take all our attention off ourselves to be only with them…looking for ways to serve them. We’re out to discover how we can make their day. We’ve made a commitment to have our customers leave with the experience of having been served. They experience being known and appreciated whether they buy fish or not. And it’s not good enough just to want that - it takes an unrelenting commitment. We’ve made it our job to make sure that experience happens for every customer.” To us, being ‘World Famous’ is a way of being. You can’t manualize it. It gets created by each one of us, newly every time. It comes out differently for different people. It also depends on who the customer is…how they react. It’s about taking care of people. We’re always on the lookout for how we can make a difference in people’s lives.

Originally we wondered, ‘How are we going to become world famous? We don’t have any money to advertise!’ Jim told us we didn’t have to know how to become world famous. He told us that when you’re generating a powerful vision, the future just unfolds. He told us not to believe in it. We just had to be it. He pointed out that there’s a big difference between a belief about something and the actual thing itself. Muhammad Ali didn’t say, ‘I believe I am the greatest.’ He said, ‘I am the greatest.’ He was declaring himself. It’s the difference between believing in the idea of being great, versus being your commitment to being great right now. Jim said, ‘Your commitment to being world famous will naturally give you what to do.’ So, as individuals, each of us choose to aligned ourselves with the commitment and declared, ‘I Am World Famous Pike Place Fish.’ Jim was right. Once we declared our commitment, things really started happening.

People want to copy us - to do what we’re doing. We keep telling them, ‘Your success isn’t in doing what we do; it’s in discovering your own way. Don’t do what we do - we made it all up…do what inspires you…make it up! You just have to be (yourself…what inspires you). And it means commit yourself to who you say you are: act like it, think like it, look like it, feel like it, speak it…be it! You will create your own way by just being yourself, doing what inspires you. The secret to our secret lies in our commitment to being who we say we are.

JUST BE IT. Your challenge is to ‘just be’ who you want to be…for free…just because you said so.

Back in 1986 the owner, John Yokoyama, hired a business consultant from bizFutures Consulting to work with us for three months on improving our team. Twenty years later he’s still working with us. What he brought was an unusual kind of education that has empowered us to envision an amazing future and have it happen. It’s called bizFutures’ Technology of Being.™
Early on our bizFutures coach encouraged us to commit ourselves to becoming "world famous" and we have accomplished this - not by spending any money on advertising (we’ve never spent a dime), but by being truly great with people. We interact with people with a strong intention to make a difference for them. We want to give each person the experience of having been served and appreciated, whether they buy fish or not. We love them.

At the World Famous Pike Place Fish Market, we know that it’s possible for each of us as human beings to impact the way other people experience life. Through our work, we’re out to improve the quality of life for everyone. We are working inside the possibility of world peace and prosperity for all people. This is our commitment -that’s who we are - it’s what we do.

bizFutures has coached us in how to communicate effectively and how to operate from a powerful vision and a unique set of generating principles. Out of this our company culture has become a model for other organizations. Pike Place Fish is now used as a case study in business schools and universities. There are at least four books that have been published about Pike Place Fish, one an international best-seller. We are the subject of the best selling training videos and DVDs in the world. Our vision is to see companies all over the world make it their business to improve the quality of life for people everywhere as well as for our planet, and we want to make this way of operating available to as many organizations as possible.